In those days, television was in its infancy and no-one had thought of reality TV; the height of banality was Crossroads, the serial with the wobbly sets produced by ATV in Birmingham and networked across ITV, yet oddly compulsive viewing as was Emergency Ward 10 from the same station. Even the Eurovision Song Contest was quite watchable in those long ago days, while big
technical advances, like the first trans-Atlantic live TV transmission by satellite, were really exciting. I vividly remember being in the ATV studios in Birmingham to see their first ever test television of colour telly, years before it became everyday practice. My uncle had a great time before World
War II appearing as a jazz singer in the early days of BBC television.
Like so many ventures, television was wildly exciting when it was starting up. Now that it's a mature medium, it has lost much of its fun and excitement, relegated to near-junk status like so many national economies in Europe.
Politicians are getting on their high horses about regulating junk food, because of its perceived dangers to adults and children alike, but they seem little concerned about the vast quantities of audio-visual rubbish on television. That too has a bad effect, mentally and physically, on young and
old alike, but the politicians don't care. Perhaps that's because it suits them to have voters subdued by what is in effect a kind of valium designed to dampen creativity and original political thought. The politicans know damn well that important issues of the day, like the probable exit of the UK from
the EU, the possible collapse of the EU itself and the more than likely demise of the euro, aren't going to be properly covered on TV. Viewers are much more concerned about the latest episodes of the truly imbecilic reality TV offerings.
I'm thinking now of Noel Coward, gone 40 years from us in 2013, and his highly apposite remark about television, because recently, the television networks in Ireland switched from analogue to digital, among the last in Europe to do so. The changeover was made successfully. Even though the Irish government made nearly €1 billion from selling the analogue frequencies so that people can enjoy 4G mobile phone services from mid-2013 (quelle joie!), they didn't give a cent to help older
and other disadvantaged viewers make the switchover. In the North of Ireland for instance, as part of its UK package, the BBC was offering such viewers a £40 package deal to help them make all the necessary arrangements. Similar arrangements were put in place in France long ago for its digital
changeover.
Despite this stinginess in Ireland, the switchover went very smoothly and complaints were few and far between. But we decided, in a moment of standing aside from the rest of the population, not to bother getting a set-top box. We still haven't got one and over the past two months, we can't
say we've missed anything about not having a television. True, I do miss things I really enjoy, like horse racing, but other things, like news, we don't miss at all. We don't miss seeing all the tedious and banal politicians trying to put a spin on things and making promises they can't keep, or all
the vulgar consumerist commercials. As for all the reality shows, we can't say we feel deprived
because we never watched them in the first place.
When it comes to television, few people realise that the French got there before the British, starting their first television service in Paris in 1931, a full five years before the BBC did the same at Alexandra Palace in London. Today, the television market in France is highly developed. There are 36 national channels, which include high definition versions of four of the most popular channels. There's also a whole host of regional and local TV services, where again, France out-performs the UK in developing local television. Some of the names are fascinating, like Voo TV in Dijon.
On our many trips around France, we've often seen regional news coverage on the France 3 network, sober and unsensational. Breakfast TV too has always been good in France and I remember one trip, when we were staying in Vichy (where France's World War II pro-Nazi government was based) and doing our own catering, it was great fun to watch breakfast TV as we were having breakfast. It was all very entertaining and informative.
But having said that, much of the programming at peak times is simply boring and especially in Paris, it's a sin to think of staying in for the evening to regarder la télé when you could have so much more fun being out for the evening, especially enjoying a good meal in a restaurant. I've mentioned it before, but I still remember vividly the time we were in our favourite restaurant in Paris, which just happens to be Chinese, and seeing two other patrons, a very elegantly dressed and elderly couple, who had obviously once been big names in the arts, quietly singing lullabies to one another. How many memories from the television will stick in your mind like that?
Having said all that, sometimes TV in France can be quite innovative, like the Euronews channel, which was set up in 1993 by 10 European public service broadcasters. It's based in Lyon and aims to tell world news from a European perspective, now broadcasting in 11 languages.
If we lived in France permanently, which in many ways I regret we don't, although French bureaucracy is a fetish best avoided, we probably would have television, but
here in dear old Ireland, we can well do without and we don't feel we are missing anything. Instead,we are reading more books and newspapers, listening to more music and generally having a more satisfactory and sociable time. Since our main purpose in watching television was news, we
find that we can actually get more from online sources, complete with their own videos, like the ones that many leading newspapers now do.
We certainly won't miss the telly over Christmas but then we have a very unorthodox
approach to Christmas anyway and don't for instance go for stuffed turkey on Christmas Day. Being vegetarian makes cooking over the Christmas holiday much more straightforward, but funnily enough, while vegetarianism is widely accepted in this part of the world, especially in the UK, it's enough to make many French chefs throw up their hands in horror and go and seek out some
disgustingly once alive piece of meat! But thinking of France, it was saddening to see the latest statistics on the number of poor people in France, 8.6 million at the latest count, all living on less than
€964 a month.
So count your blessings and enjoy Christmas and even more, new year, with or without telly. We'll be managing perfectly well without that screen in the corner, audio-visual opium for the masses. That great master of the ad lib, Noel Coward, certainly had his finger on the button - the off
button.